A word from the IACA President

How has the lockdown affected you personally?

It has been a blessing in disguise to be able to spend time with family. Not rushing and travelling as I have been in the past. We have had time to reflect on what is important and we realise as long as we have each other we can survive anything. In my house we have six grandchildren, my daughter and partner all in the house together, it’s been busy and noisy but we’ve all been well and we hope to carry this togetherness and connection out of this time and keep it in our day to day lives.

How has the lockdown affected the IACA board? How was the first Zoom Board Meeting?

We haven’t been able to meet as often as usual we’ve had one Zoom board meeting, but for us as an Indigenous organization the Zoom meetings don’t provide the ability to engage with one another and make decisions with the proper cultural authority required. The technology doesn’t allow us to be guided by eye contact, body language and facial expressions, nor the importance of what is not said as much as what is said. As the chair I can’t embrace the Zoom technology, there is no Kinship and fellowship there with the computer screen; we need that cup of tea and face to face yarn. It has affected our ability to make decisions with cultural authority, but we’ve made the best of it and have delayed culturally important decisions until we can meet face to face again and engage in true customary decision making.

What are your thoughts on IACA’s response to COVID Travel restrictions, cancellation of the members conference and move to online training?

IACA has taken a very practical approach and provided online training to its members which has worked well and enabled the art centres to learn new things and have had the time to implement their new skills in the art centre. The Advocacy work IACA has done to provide extra funds for the art centres has been amazing and so gratefully received.

What is your outlook for the future?

I believe the landscape has changed forever we are still not sure how that will all look when this disease is gone but we are an adaptive and resilient mob we’ve been adapting for 1000s of years and I think the future is bright. I hope we can learn from this time, take the good and make change, especially regarding the environment. There will be some pain, but we need to be innovative and embrace the change that needs to occur.

Phil Rist is the executive officer of the Girringun Aboriginal Corporation and Deputy Chair of the North Queensland Land Council. Phil is a widely respected Nywaigi Indigenous leader whose skill and determination has played a key role in establishing the Girringun Aboriginal Corporation as one of the most successful Indigenous community based organisations in Australia.